Americans received just over 3 million initial doses of the coronavirus vaccines from Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech in the 19 days after the first shipments, according to a Bloomberg count of government websites and data from the CDC.
Why it matters: It is far below Operation Warp Speed’s goal of administering 20 million doses by the end of the year, raising concerns about how long it may take until enough people are vaccinated in the U.S. to get life back to normal.
What is happening: Federal officials say 14 million doses of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines were distributed in the United States on Wednesday morning, but delays in vaccine application occurred at the end of the process, the New York Times reports.
- Some clinics that administer vaccines are on reduced holiday hours, while federal officials left practical details of the final implementation “for overworked local health workers and hospitals,” according to the Times.
- Some governors also said they did not receive enough funding from the federal government to support the infrastructure needed for a mass deployment.
- Operation Warp Speed officials said at a news conference on Wednesday that they expect the vaccination process to be speeded up as soon as pharmacies offer injections in stores.
By the numbers: 0.9% of the US population has been vaccinated, while only 25% of vaccines distributed to states so far have been administered, according to the Bloomberg count (last updated on December 31 at 11:30 am).
- Data reported to CDC in “significantly delayed” doses administered, a Health and Human Services spokesperson tweeted Tuesday, citing “a big difference between the number of doses delivered and the number of doses administered.”
What they are saying: Former FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb tweeted on Thursday that the coronavirus vaccine “could be a tool to help reduce the impact of the current wave of the epidemic’s spread; but we are missing the narrow window that we had to implement it quickly enough to change the current trajectory of death and illness in January. ”
- Gottlieb added that the new highly infectious variant of COVID discovered in the UK and reported in two U.S. states this week “makes it more urgent”.
- Moncef Slaoui, the White House’s chief scientific advisor for Operation Warp Speed, told the Times: “We agree that this number is lower than we expected … We know it should be better and we are working hard to make it better.”
- Anthony Fauci, director of NIAID told CNN on Tuesday that US vaccination rates “are certainly not in the numbers we would like at the end of December” – but that he believes the momentum will increase in January.
Between the lines: The Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines require a two-dose regimen. Pfizer warned in a statement this week that “there is no data” to prove that one dose of its vaccine will protect people from infection after 21 days, after the United Kingdom and some Canadian provinces changed their strategy to prioritize the administration of so many doses. unique as possible.
What to watch: Joe Biden plans to use the Defense Production Act to administer 100 million vaccines by May 1.
Go deeper: Coronavirus vaccine schedules vary widely across the world